We may feel called to step up to the plate to create change, but how? What is an “authentic calling” in an upside-down world? Is finding such a path more difficult in this radically shifting climate? Is it more essential? What role can mysticism and spirit play in helping us align to a higher calling?

Assisi, Italy, http://www.carolineallen.com I’m working on a series of four novels, EARTH, AIR, FIRE and WATER, two of which are expat novels (stories set in foreign countries). In EARTH, my protagonist is rooted to a farm in America. In AIR, she floats above the culture in the Orient. In FIRE, her ego is burned […]

Somewhere in London, 15-Minute Painting Series, http://www.carolineallen.com, 2012 When I was a little girl in Missouri, we had only two books in the house, a King James Bible and the Farmer’s Almanac. I was voracious for books, insatiable. I remember reading and re-reading food labels, anything to be able to absorb the glory of words. […]

In working recently with a gifted screenplay writer on the revision of one of his scripts, I realized that there’s a common psychological path when it comes to revision (whether it’s a novel, memoir or screenplay) that shows up with all my clients. First let me make it clear that as a writing coach, I […]

self portrait, acrylic on canvas, http://www.carolineallen.com You want to write, but you’re staring at a blank screen, and you don’t know where to begin. Or, you keep rewriting the first sentence over and over and over again. Stop. Think rough. Think rough draft. It’s impossible to edit something that isn’t yet on the page, and […]

Jesus, colored pencil on paper, based on a medieval altar piece in London’s National Gallery, 2007, by Caroline Allen I coach a lot of writers who were once students, and after the class is finished, many want to continue working with other writers in a dynamic group setting. And so the search for a writers’ […]